Harvard Law, Duke University fall out of top 5 in latest US News law school rankings
Stanford Law School and Yale Law School tied for first place in rankings released Tuesday by U.S. News & World Report, the same spot that they occupied in last year’s list.
Harvard Law School and the Duke University School of Law fell out of the top five; they are now tied at No. 6.
The biggest gain among the top 14 was Vanderbilt University, which moved up five spots to reach No. 14 in a tie with three others law schools. Cornell University had the biggest downward movement compared to last year’s top 14, falling four spots to No. 18 in a tie with one other school.
Here are the top 20 law schools, with comparisons to last year, in the U.S. News & World Report 2025 Best Graduate Schools rankings:
1) Stanford Law School (same) and Yale Law School (same)
3) The University of Chicago Law School (same)
4) The University of Virginia School of Law (same)
5) The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School (down 1)
6) The Duke University School of Law (down 2) and Harvard Law School (down 2)
8) The New York University School of Law (up 1) and the University of Michigan Law School at Ann Arbor (up 1)
10) Columbia University (down 2) and the Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law (down 1)
12) The University of California at Los Angeles School of Law (up 1)
13) The University of California at Berkeley School of Law (down 1)
14) The Georgetown University Law Center (same), the University of Texas School of Law at Austin (up 2), the Vanderbilt University Law School (up 5) and the Washington University School of Law at St. Louis (up 2)
18) Cornell Law School (down 4) and the University of North Carolina School of Law at Chapel Hill (up 2)
20) The University of Minnesota Law School (down 4) and the Notre Dame Law School (same)
Nearly 60% of the formula used by U.S. News & World Report to determine rankings is based on successful job placement and bar passage. The rest is based on faculty resources; academic achievements of entering students; and opinions by law schools, lawyers and judges on quality.
The rankings are based on data disclosed to the ABA and U.S. News & World Report surveys of ABA-accredited law schools. Out of about 200 law schools surveyed, 154 responded.
Just how important are the U.S. News & World Report rankings? A survey of 93 law school admissions officers by the Kaplan test prep company found that 62% think that the rankings “have lost some of their prestige over the last couple of years.” In 2023, 51% of admissions officers held that view.
A Kaplan survey of 306 prelaw students, however, found that only 26% thought that it would be a “positive development for both law schools and applicants to no longer have law school rankings at all.”
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